That was the message from Country Day girls' coach Wayne Aaron, whose Hornets crushed East Laurens 11-0 in the first round of the Area 3-AA/A playoffs.

It also was the message from Country Day boys' coach Peter Foley, whose Hornets beat Dodge County 7-0.

Both of Country Day's teams advanced to next week's area semifinals. The Hornets' girls will play Wednesday and the Hornets' boys will play Thursday against opponents to be determined.

"You don't want to get ahead of yourselves," said Country Day senior Katie Ratterree, who scored a goal and had an assist. "You have to take it game by game because you never know what will happen."

Ratterree was one of nine senior girls who celebrated Country Day's "Senior Day" along with 14 senior boys. Her goal with 2:36 to play in the game served as the punctuation point on a dominant display by the Hornets (8-3-2).

In the first half, Country Day outshot East Laurens, 29-0. Two shots by Country Day's Candice Aaron struck the crossbar, while one of Ramee's shots glanced off the right goal post.

Falcons goalkeeper Christy Giles made eight saves in the first half. Country Day goalkeeper Danielle Dueno was the loneliest player on the field - she did not make a save the entire game because East Laurens (1-8) did not attempt a shot.

Country Day led 8-0 at halftime, but the Hornets did not score their first goal until there was 20:49 remaining before the break.

"In the first 20 minutes, we played a little flat and didn't pass as well as we should have," Country Day coach Aaron said. "We were focusing on passing in the second half. We also needed to work on long shots and headers, and that's what we did in the second half."

Said the Hornets' Hagan, "We all knew that we couldn't get overconfident because it would hurt us."

"This is exactly what we wanted," said Foley, whose Hornets led 6-0 at halftime. "We got to play pretty much everybody. We got our starters rested. It's nice to get one where you can work on some things."

Country Day improved to 11-4, while Dodge County fell to 7-4.

"We had never seen this team, so we didn't know what to expect," Shuman said. "We were able to move the ball around well. That's why, I feel, we were able to get as many goals as we did. It was from passing the ball around a lot."